My sons and I went to Long Island, to my mom's tiny apartment, for the holiday. We bought a VT fresh turkey and the holiday went really well.
The next 5 days weren't as easy.
The TV is a major player at my mom's place. There is no way to get away from it. No matter where you sit or stand, other than the bathroom, there IT IS.
My last 2 days there were starting to take a toll. I call our culture of BUYING and looking PERFECT the matrix. The shows on TV, the reality ones, the commercials/news/shows of botox-induced women...I started to feel so unconnected that it was bordering on scary.
I look around and can't figure out if anyone is paying attention. I know there are many smart people in the world, a lot smarter than me, yet I don't see it in the day-to-day stuff.
I find myself shaking my head in utter amazement or utter disgust. I feel very alone.
I stand there and want to shout "The emperor has NO CLOTHES!!!! What the hell are you doing?"
Main stream America scares me. Now, I don't want to live in fear, so I am not sure what to do with this.
I wonder if prior to WWII there were people in Germany who looked around and wondered what the hell was going on? Where is the decency and common concern? Who is speaking the truth? Who is manipulating the news, media, laws?
I am watching things move along in a strong fast current...
computers, ipods, a new TV show about a serial killer who mutilates women, zombie movies, violent gaming, objectified women in all aspects of media, macho military men with machine guns.
Where is the outrage? It seems to take another high school shooting to get the conversation going, yet even then the focus is on the child NOT the environment in which this child grew up.
To bring this back to a personal level, I am starting to think I am a BIG misfit, that I do not belong here anymore. It is as though I am standing in the middle of crowd and yet I am on a tiny ice float in the middle of this fast river, being swept away.
As a parent I have been a dam holding back the waters so my sons have time to grow up naturally. I want them to be rooted to the earth, to their true nature, before they go out there. What anchors most kids, people? I have no clue.
I feel less and less part of this society. It passed through my mind several times in the last day or 2 that maybe my time here is over. Maybe there isn't any reason to stay here and keep fighting this current.
Do I give in?
It's not giving in, I am just REALY tired of standing up and withstanding these pounding waters. The waters are EVERYWHERE it seems. I honestly do not understand all of this.
When I was Italy, I saw silly things on the TV in Rome, but I didn't feel it as much when I was walking around there. I hardly felt it at all in the Umbria regions. It wasn't as pervasive there.
Perhaps this is the way life goes, the changing of the generations. Unfortunately, the people I know who are my age, even my brother and cousins, and mother have embraced this new lifestyle.
I am a lone voice. Even my children balk at my pulling back the curtain on our society.
Joseph Campbell used to say "Don't let the machine (society) eat you up" But he never said how lonely it is when you do.
I am thankful that I see what I see. What I wouldn't give to hear someone else utter the words,
"The emperor is naked!".
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